Ducks News

Boudreau Reflects on an Off Night, Ducks' Top Scorers Producing and More

by
Staff Writer
/ Anaheim Ducks

In the wake of a disappointing 6-2 loss to Dallas that snapped a six-game home winning streak, Ducks coach Bruce Boudreau spoke to reporters Thursday afternoon:

On having an off nightWe alluded to that this morning in the meeting. You can see it creeping it and we have made mention of it. We played so, so good until the Ottawa game. Then, I thought we played average at best in the Colorado game, but won. Then, we lost in Dallas. We played okay, but didn’t play at the level we had. We had the break and then played against Phoenix. I thought our first period was substandard. We won, but we played okay. Then, we had last night. We have to rectify that. We haven’t let it slide without noticing. It’s time to get back up to the top.On the Ducks' top playersThe third line has scored more goals 5-on-5 than the other two lines, I think combined It’s fabulous to have that other scoring. But you’re not going to win unless your best players are your best players. That is the simple fact on any team in any organization. If Eli Manning stinks the place up this week, I don’t care how good the Giants defense is, they’re not going to win. The same with Tom Brady. It’s the same in any sport. You look at the NBA Finals. LeBron wasn’t exactly very good and how did they do? We need our best player to be our best players.

I have to believe you challenge them a little bit. I brought a few of them in today and said "We need you to better." We aren’t going to win unless they are better. It’s great to have a lot of our role players playing great, but the great players have to be the great players. Everybody sees it. It’s not just out there that we’re winning and getting by. No matter who you are, if you’re best players aren’t your best players, you’re not successful. They can work really hard and do all the right things, but they have to start producing.

Boudreau and Selanne on the state of the Ducks

On the power playI’m looking league-wide right now. For the most part, all power plays are down. It’s a good group, but we need to be better. We need to be better than a goal every five and a half or five and a quarter attempts. We need to get it to every four and a half attempts on an average. Last night was a good example. We have a 1-0 lead, get a power play and if we make that in a 2-0 lead, who knows if they are going to get three goals in the last six minutes of the first period? Even though we make it 4-2, we got a power play. If we make it 4-3, the momentum is coming to our side. Those are times you have to put it in.

For the most part, we’re too cute. We try to make the perfect play. In recent memory, the goals we’ve scored on it, it’s the ones we shoot, get rebounds and converge on the net. Those are the ones you end up scoring on. You look at even Dallas’ goal last night, it’s just simple perimeter plays and then a shot with a good screen. It’s a good goal. When Blakey hurt his foot on the power play, it went shot, he’s in front of the net, rebound, shot. You can go on and on. You look at all the great power plays. When Detroit had a great power play, it was because Rafalski and Lidstrom could shoot the puck. When we were at 26 percent in Washington two years ago, it was because Ovechkin and Green were shooting the puck. It was not because they were making unbelievable plays. We have a tendency to get the puck back there, want to get it down low and dangle. When we do that, it doesn’t work.

It sounds simple and it’s relayed in simple terms. It’s a lot more difficult when you get out there. There is opposition. When you have talented and they think they can make that play, they try that. It doesn’t work and it ticks coaches off.

On blocked shotsIt lifts the other team, I know that. Any time you block shots, your own bench is uplifted because it’s a courageous thing to block shots. When you block shots, it’s a momentum shifter. When we were having that good streak in January, we were blocking shots left, right and center. Everybody was committed. Last night, they had shots from the point that were going through two and three guys before it gets to the goalie. Those shots would have been blocked a week ago.

We show clips every day of whether the team is a good shot-blocking team on the power play or not. We show all their tendencies on when they do block shots, what we do if we fake it, when and how we attack nets when they are blocked. It’s not about getting psyched out. We should know when it’s about to happen.

On reboundsThey were available, but in all honesty we were going right and it was going left. It wasn’t if we weren’t going to the net to get the rebounds. I remember two or three in particular where we were there and its’ going this way. I don’t know if that is a good steer by Lehtonen or we were in the wrong place at the wrong time, whereas Nystrom is in perfect position for a rebound. In the last 10 games, those would have been steered to the side. There are others there that you are almost getting to and I don’t know if were winning those battles last night. There were rebounds laying there and they were winning those battles. Those are the ones you wish you could get back.